Now that staff and the Planning Commission have given the Comprehensive Plan to the Council, we have started our review of said plan. Based on this feedback, staff has started to submit edits, and we will be holding a work session this Thursday. Here is a summary that Alderman Arnett put together regarding the updates:

Last week we had a work session where the Public Works Department gave us an update on all of the Capital Improvement Projects that are in the current budget. The summary below was put together by Alderman Arnett. 

I want to start off by talking about a State issue. I was listening to WYPR’s “On the Record”, where they interviewed Jake Day, the governor’s secretary of housing, about the governor’s "Housing expansion and affordability act of 2024" HB0538 & SB0484, which caused me to read the State bills. What I've found is that this flawed legislation would basically preempt local zoning code, by allowing certain "qualified projects" to avoid the density limits set by local jurisdictions. Qualified projects are affordable housing projects where a non-profit owns the land, or where the State used to own the land, or where a project is near a rail station. For projects where a non-profit owns the land, we would be unable to "impose any unreasonable limitation or requirements" that concern height, setback, bulk, parking, or "similar requirements". It goes further to state that for all "state-funded affordable housing projects" local jurisdictions cannot use our Adequate Public Facilities law to deny or restrict (if it may cause adverse impact such as impacting viability or degree of affordability or the allowable density) said project". This would mean that we may not be able to require adequate water capacity, sewer capacity, police & fire, roads, sidewalks, stormwater management, cycling, or recreational space (we already exempt such projects from our school APF). What this means is that when this density gets added, the residents living there will have to suffer without adequate infrastructure. Who will pay to make sure they do have adequate infrastructure? The local taxpayers. We would be left holding the bag with no help from the State. They are essentially saying "we care so much about affordable housing that we are going to break down red tape for you by overruling local jurisdictions, but we aren't going to pay for it at all." 

As I raised in my Tuesday Capital op-ed, it's neither fair nor right for us to put new residents or existing residents into this situation. Nor does it further any of our other infrastructure goals (be it transportation/ cycling or public safety). Nor is it right for the State to preempt our local authority. 

Unfortunately, ALL of our local State representatives are supporting this flawed bill. Senator Elfreth and Delegates Henson & Jones are all listed as sponsors. If you have concerns about this, please reach out to them. 

Getting back to Annapolis issues, we have one piece of legislation up for a public hearing (park hours in West Annapolis), and a few pieces up for a final vote. Details below.

Stay healthy and stay safe,

Rob

We have a few things up for a public hearing at Monday’s Council meeting. Most important of those is a hearing on legislation that would adopt the 2024 Comprehensive Plan. For those that don’t know, this plan lays out overall development (and beyond) goals for the the City. There is now an executive summary that I’d encourage you to read over. I suspect we will have a few amendments to the plan, but we won’t get to work on those until after the public hearing. One thing I want to push for is to have a specific cycling infrastructure goal that collects together all of our action items on that matter, since that’s a high priority for me. Creating cycling infrastructure will improve traffic, make our roads safer, improve our health, make mobility more equitable, and improve our economy. It’s a win-win-win-win-win prospect. So expect to see a lot from me regarding this issue over the next few years.

Stay healthy and stay safe,

Rob

We don’t have any legislation up for a public hearing on Monday. I’m introducing some legislation seeking to reform our commission/board nomination process, in the hopes of creating a backup nomination process (details below). My gas-powered leaf blower ban legislation has finally made it out of committee and is ready for review by the entire Council. Details on that below as well. Eagerly awaiting quieter summer and fall days… My Short term rental legislation will also need to be postponed again, but we are making progress in committee. There’s a lot in there to get through, I admit.

 That’s about all. Hope you all are enjoying this warmer weather. As someone from the Poconos, I am eagerly awaiting the return of cold weather.

 Stay healthy and stay safe,

 Rob

There may appear to be a lot on the Council agenda for Monday, but most items are getting postponed due to the Committees needing to finish their work. This includes my short term rental legislation and my gas-powered leaf blower ban. Nothing much to report except that we are once again extending outdoor dining for another year via Resolution, to buy us more time to complete our permanent code changes.

Besides that, the Planning Commission has held their first public hearing on the City Dock reconstruction project. If you support it or have other comments you are able to submit public testimony directly to the Planning Commission or do so in person (virtually) at their next meeting on February 1^st.

Stay healthy and stay safe,

Rob

I hope you had a pleasant holiday and I’d like to wish everyone a happy new year. I look forward to the opportunity to represent you for another year, and if you have any concerns or comments please let me know.

Thanks to everyone who took the time to complete the community survey. If you are curious as to the results, you can view them here.

Carr’s Beach final acquisition

Tonight we are set to authorize a supplemental appropriation (SA-19-24) of additional Program Open Space Money for the acquisition of the Moore property. This is the last piece of the puzzle that will allow the City to preserve the remaining portions of Carrs/Elktonia Beach.

Brewer Hill Cemetary stormwater restoration

The second supplemental appropriation (SA-20-24) is an authorization for us to utilize State grant money to restore part of the stormwater outfall in Brewer’s Hill cemetary. This is an historical African American cemetary that was/is experiencing erosion associated with a stormwater outfall under West Street. This particular outfall was connected to when the Severn Savings bank building was constructed, and up until a few years back the developer had not properly restored this outfall per original permit conditions. This lead to erosion in the cemtary that atually exposed skulls and graves. I believe this has now been largely resolved when the developer installed a plunge pool, but apparently there is still erosion further downstream that this grant money will be addressing.

Not like it needs to be said, but I’m inclined to support both of these SAs.

Stay healthy and stay safe,

Rob

On Monday next week we have our one and only Council meeting for this month. Nothing is up for a public hearing, but there is plenty of legislation on the agenda for second (final) reader. Please let me know if you have thoughts on any of them.

Town Hall meeting Tuesday Dec 12^th 7:30-8:30pm

This will be a short meeting, given that I could only book the library for an hour. I’ll schedule a longer one for later this winter or spring, depending on demand/requests. Since it will be shorter, I’ll limit myself to 20 or 30 minutes to give you a few updates and then open the floor to Q&A.

Public meeting on proposal for Taco Bell at Bay Ridge Giant shopping center – Dec 19^th 6pm at library.

A developer is proposing to construct a Taco Bell with a drive-thru at the corner of the Bay Ridge Giant shopping Center at Bay Ridge Rd and Edgewood Rd. The meeting will be on December 19^th at 6pm at the Eastport-Annapolis Neck library. I personally have concerns about adding yet another drivethru to this area, due to the traffic and the auto-centric nature of such development. We are trying to move to more mixed use (i.e. walkable/bikeable shops and housing), and utilize more of that lot for some actual stormwater management (they have none) or for a mobility/transit hub. Allowing for this suburban sprawl will do nothing to help us get to that point and will instead make us like every other chain-store USA suburban street. I don’t know about you, but I have higher hopes for Ward 7.

Netherlands presentation

If you would like to learn more about our work study delegation trip to the Netherlands, you can view our presentation here (Youtube).

Midnight madness

Lastly, we have two more Midnight Madness events left! Hope to see you at one of them (Thursday nights).

Stay healthy and stay safe,

Rob

Happy Thanksgiving! I hope everyone had a pleasant time with family and loved ones. Don’t forget about our Grand Illumination today at 6pm downtown.

Below you will find details on the holidays in Annapolis (and our parking discounts), as well as information on tomorrow’s Council meeting. Please let me know if you have thoughts on anything on our agenda.

I also wanted to remind you to fill out the community survey if you haven’t done so already. Today or tomorrow are your last days to do so.

On Wednesday from 5-6:30 is our Ward 7/8 community meeting regarding the City Dock redevelopment project. This project represents a complete re-envisioning and rebuild of our City dock area. The primary intention is to prepare for sea level rise related to the climate crisis, but at the same time we want to increase the amount of usable green/open space downtown and move the cars to our new garage.

Also, as you’ve seen in the newspaper, our local/state delegation has returned from the Netherlands. We traveled with two representatives from the Moore administration (Planning Secretary Flora and Risk Reduction Director Sara Bender) and the County Bicycle and Pedestrian Planner Tanya Asman. Those from the Council included Mayor Buckley, myself, and Aldermen Schandelmeier, Gay, and O’Neal. We were hosted by the Dutch Cycling Embassy and the Netherland Water Partnership, who had created daily agendas packed with presentations, meetings, and tours of their infrastructure. We will be releasing more information about this shortly but suffice it to say it was an incredible experience that I wish I had done earlier in my first term. Hearing about and seeing the flood mitigation technologies, approaches, and mindset of the Dutch was incredibly useful as we face our own flooding challenges. We will be incorporating what we’ve learned into our projects and initiatives. The same can be said of the cycling infrastructure. To say they are avid cyclists is an understatement. They have complete infrastructure enabling and promoting cycling. I’ve never seen so many cyclists! In contrast with the United States, cyclists rule the road in the Netherlands. Building such networks enables healthier citizens (even seniors cycle out there regularly and use the paths for travel on their scooters), connected and more equitable neighborhoods, less traffic and parking issues, improved economic growth (known as bikeconomics) and more sustainable transportation (from an environmental and climate perspective). I hope we can incorporate some of what we learned to address the parking and traffic concerns we have locally. Expect more to come on all of this.

Town Hall meeting – NEW DATE – Tuesday Dec 12^th 7:30-8:30pm

Since I had to cancel the November Town Hall meeting, I’ve found a new date for Tuesday, December 12^th. The only catch is that we will only have an hour (7:30-8:30). For that reason, I’ll keep things short and just give you a 20 minute or so update and then we can have an open dialog for the rest of the meeting. Unfortunately, I couldn’t find a better date/time. I’ll try to get the meetings scheduled out for this spring and next fall earlier so we can have more time for dialog or even a special guest. As always, I would really appreciate any help you can provide in spreading the word. I'll have flyers made up shortly to hand out in your communities. If you can help, please let me know.

Stay healthy and stay safe,

Rob

I only have a few items for you this week. First off, I wanted to remind you again about the important community survey. We haven’t done this in over 10 years I believe, so it’s important to gauge what the public’s views are of the services we provide.

Town Hall meeting – CANCELLED

I do apologize, but I need to cancel the Town Hall meeting I had scheduled for November 20^th. I believe we are having a special Council meeting rescheduled for that evening. I will get the Town Hall meeting rescheduled for December and let you know of the new date.

Stay healthy and stay safe,

Rob